Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1887-12-09
CONNECTICUT COONS.
FAMOUS COON DOGS OF THE
NOTED "DEVIL'S HOP YARD"

wv - OINiIO tiOi TitDs
When the Season Sets in-Vhat the Coon
Fattens On and How He Is Brought
Down Out of the Tree-COon Suppers.
Fighting the Dogs.
The coon season sets in in Connecticut
about the middle of September and continues
until cold weather. but the farmers do not
make a business of the sport until after
the corn has been husked and other
autumn chores have been done. The coon is
ripest and juiciest in the period between Oct.
Is and Nov. Is, and being stuffed full of
Indian corn, fall poultry, chestnuts and
acorns, he is less nimble; he cannot run so
far after the dogs once get on his trail His
wits are not so sharp either, and usually as
soon as the first hue and cry of lot of stall
wart country lads, with couple of excited
dogs, is borne to him on the still, crisp au-
tumn air, he waddles away into the heart of
the most convenient swamp, pulls his corpu-
lent body to the top of an evergreen or black
oak tree and waits for the chase If the night
is starlit it is an easy thing to do to pick him
off his lofty perch with a charge of No. 9
shot driven with three-and-a-half drachms
of powder behind his foreshoulder. A fat
coon that has been shot in this way usually
sits still and thinks a moment. until he has
fully made up his mind that his burden is
more than he can bear, then he topples con-
tentedly over and comes tumbling down
among the tree limbs with the punky thud of
decayed pumpkin rolling out of cart. He
strikes the ground, a large round ball of fur,
aud instantly four arms tipped with sharp
hooks shoot out just in time to catch two
dogs that have been excitedly waiting for
this act in the entertainment. The coon has
now become buzz saw, and each time that
he revolves a dog loses several pieces of his
hide or a bit of his ear Or lip Over and over
the three animals spin, dogs snarling and
swapping, coon biting and striking and spIut-
tering, and the revolutions do not cease until
the motive power gives out and the coon is a
limp bag of fat in the jaws of his fierce foes.
After the game has been killed one of the
hunters throws it over his shoulders and the
dogs are driven off into the woods to look I'D
a new trail.
THE BEST COON REGION
The best coon country in Connecticut is the
rocky, wooded, picturesque region between
the Connecticut and Thames rivers. 1t is the
kind of land that coon revels and grows
fat in. There are rich meadows and arabic
hillsides, where farmers can raise fine corn
for coons; there are almost impenetrable
swamps, to which coons can retire in times of
stress; there are deep, gloomy valleys, walled
in by frowning, chaotic masses of rocks. that
are pierced by winding chambers and cavi
ties, and there are long forests of big trees,
with hole in every fifth tree, into which o
coon can slip in the early morning after a
night OF it in the corn lot OF at farmers
poultry yard.
About fourteen miles west of Norwich. and
six or seven from the Connecticut river. is a
deep valley of singular formation that is re-
for wild and fantastic scenery. It
is known IN half the state as the "Devils Hop
Yard" and it is the center of a tract of
country OF legendary renown. Here coons
and witches have been hunted from an i'm
time. At the north roaring trout
stream leaps through a jagged throat in the
hills over powders and Lodges, sixty feet or
more, into the valley, which expands on
either hand until it is half mile in width in
its broadcast part, and rushes through a mar
row gap between vertical precipices three
miles below at the southern limit of the hop
yard. On each side the valley is hemmed in
by perpendicular, almost seamless walls OF
block granite; the mountains are begirt by a
wide wilderness, with here and there a farm
amid the woods, and, as far as the business of
men is concerned, it is practically out of the
world The Devils Hop Yard, so called be-
cause the devil used to chop" in it with Had
dam witches before the world became too
dull and commonplace for a romantic gentle \
man IN black with horns on his head to take
any interest in it, is, together with the ell
vlronlng country, the paradise of coon hunt
ers and the nursery of typical coon dogs
Nowhere else are the coon hunter and tht
coon dog to be met with in their full and com
plete glory.
1t requires an extraordinary dog for hunt |
ing coons, for no other animal leaves so deli
cate and Heetlng scent. 1t is up to all the !
tricks of the fox, too, in battling pursuit. L |
here is any process for breeding a successful
coon dog it is not known A setter or
pointer may do artistic work in his own fiell |
hat no other dog can rival, and foxhouna |
nay be superb in his line, but all may be |
practically worthless for coon hunting. A
good coon dog may have cross from al |
other hunting dogs, and there may be .
BROAD stripe OF mongrel in his make UP, vet |
10 one can say just what it is that makes |
lim great in his profession There are
scores of coon dogs, but a first rate one j., |
are, and his value priceless.
THE TYPICAL COON DOG I
A good coon dog is born, not made. He is |
5he Scotchman, or Yankee, of the canine |
'pecies-one trait he must possess above all |
others, he must be canny. The DEVILS Hop |
Yard raises the best coon dogs There are |
dozen dogs, owned by farmers in
is region about the yard, that cannot be !
bought for $50, and for one or two of the |
number 800 bill would appeal in vain for |
acceptance by way of exchange Yet two of |
hem are homely, shaggy looking fellows |
lbout the farm, with brown coats and mild |
brown eyes; and another is apparently |
ross between foxhound and shepherd |
log. In the head of each just above the |
yes, is bump that sticks out like a knob on |
IN oak root; that bunch is supposed to con- |
ain the combination that is set for coops. |
Without which they would not be worth $50 |
md 500 apiece.
The hunters OF the hop yard have done lit
lie else since the first day of October but stir
Up the coons. There is little money in hunt
ng them for their fur or their meat, but it is
customary each fall for hunters to drive out
o the yard from Norwich, New London.
liddletown, and from Moodus and the Had |
lams on the Connecticut river for night of
oon hunting, and the local hunters act as
,u1des. In this way the famous dogs are
worth their price to their masters. There is
wrong with the night or with the
hunters II one of these parties returns at day.
light with less than from four to ten coons. |
The hunters go home with their load of
,ame, the youngest and latest animal is
arefully dressed by caterer and roasted,
nd at night the party and their friends have
coon supper, which they wash down with
mugs of beer, hard cider and sometimes
lunch. Epicures rarely express a similar
pinion about the flavor of roast coon; some
hink it resembles that of roast pig, others |
etect likeness to that of mutton, still
thers say that it savors of bears meat, and
few profess to find it combination of
mutton, bear and pig iavors. Many other
men who have made desperate efforts to eat
coon supper confess that they would rather
ry woodchuck OF black cat next time.-
Norwich Comm Cor. New York Sun.